


Colorblind

by bag_of_catZY (catZY)



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Apocalypse, M/M, Robots, Soulmates - Alternate Universe
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-01
Updated: 2016-06-06
Packaged: 2018-07-11 14:49:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7056910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catZY/pseuds/bag_of_catZY
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky's probably got the worst luck in the entire universe. He woke up from the nightmare that was the Winter Soldier into an even worse one: killer robots have taken over the world. Now, after several months on the run with Steve and Sam, they run into a certain genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist everyone thought was dead. Bucky’s world immediately goes from colorless to colorful - literally, which means this man is his soulmate. But can they stop fighting long enough to survive the robot apocalypse and each other?</p><p>Or,<br/>Imagine a world in which Project Insight involved intelligent, Ultron-like robots instead of the Helicarriers. They’ve slipped Hydra’s leash and now nobody can stop them. And on top of that, imagine that in this world, everyone sees things in grayscale until they meet their soulmate. Tony and Bucky are soulmates who get off on the wrong foot. (Yeah, Sam and Steve are shaking their heads at this hot mess in the background, too.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ZeeK](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZeeK/gifts).



> Part 2 is coming right up!
> 
> I rated it Teen & Up just to be safe because of the explicit language. Otherwise, there's no nudity or gore.

Bucky’s sharp eyes roved through the deserted streets and over dilapidated buildings. They needed to find shelter, and fast. He and Steve could probably support Sam for another few miles—the serum running through their veins made sure of that—but Sam wouldn’t last much longer without rest, water, food, and medical supplies, in that order.

In their last run-in with the dumb apocalyptic bots, Sam had gotten sliced in his side by an energy beam and broken his leg. He was barely conscious as he hung between Bucky’s and Steve’s supporting arms. To be honest, Steve was looking pretty peaky, too. Normally, Sam would block Steve from feeling Sam’s pain through their bond—no matter Steve’s insistence that he would rather know what his soulmate was going through and share the burden. The fact that Sam wasn’t doing so anymore wasn’t a good sign.

Through the rapidly falling darkness, Bucky spied a building that, though just as dirty and trashed as the others, had a solid framework and an unbroken roof. There would hopefully be some basement level where they could avoid detection, where Bucky could leave Steve to guard and nurse Sam while he went out for a supply run.

Bucky caught Steve’s eyes and jerked his head to the building. Steve nodded in understanding, and together they moved Sam towards it. Before Steve could smash through the boarded up door, Bucky waved his attention to a side alley. There was probably a back entrance. Even if it was locked, breaking and entering there would be less conspicuous than through the front.

Ah-ha! There was a door. Bucky turned the handle to find it unlocked. It seemed after their unseasonably long streak of bad luck, they were finally starting to get lucky. It was completely dark inside, but Bucky’s superior night vision easily picked out the fact that it was deserted and the giant hulking shapes of abandoned machinery littered everywhere. Was this place an old machine shop?

Bucky helped Steve drag Sam inside and, after clearing the floor in a promising looking corner, lay Sam down gently onto the ground. Despite their best efforts to be gentle, Sam still hissed as his wounds were jostled. Steve muttered apologies and reassurances and gently lifted Sam’s head to rest in his lap. Sam visibly relaxed at his soulmate’s voice and touch.

Bucky handed over his canteen and Steve accepted it gratefully. It was the last of his water, but Sam needed it more. Besides, Bucky and Steve could go a lot longer than most people without fulfilling basic needs.

As Bucky did a perimeter check and cursorily inspected the machines, he reviewed a mental checklist of all he had to do. He had to find potable water and medical supplies immediately, and food if he could get it. Bucky nearly sighed in frustration at how difficult fulfilling such simple needs had become. He and Stevie had managed to scrape through World War II—granted, neither of them had quite survived it, but at least they generally had enough food and water and sometimes even nearby facilities to receive medical treatment—why was it so hard to survive now?

Bucky knew why. If they had been living in the wilderness, they could have found running water and hunted for food. They’d probably be shit out of luck when it came to medical supplies, but if they’d given up on fixing things and just run away, they probably wouldn’t have been fighting robots and getting beat to hell  and needing medical supplies in the first place. Bucky knew none of the three of them were the type to run away from a world that needed saving with their tails tucked between their legs. But God, Bucky sometimes wished they were. Waking up after seventy years of Hydra brainwashing to this shit show was some cosmic joke. It was like his life was in the hands of a particularly capricious divine entity.

Bucky had the right to be bitter, boy did he, but that kind of thinking was worse than useless. He turned around to let Steve know he was going to head out for a supply run when sudden hiss like a seal breaking sounded through the open space. Bucky immediately ran for Steve and Sam to protect them. When Bucky reached them, he found Steve had already pulled Sam into a standing position in case they needed to hightail it out of there and was supporting him with one arm while the other held the shield at the ready. The hiss turned into light suddenly spilling into the room through a previously undiscovered trapdoor.

A man-sized shape jumped out and Bucky nearly shot it out of reflex. The gleam of metal and the familiar glow of energy weapons almost triggered Bucky’s robot-killing instincts, but at a second glance, the man-sized shape was actually a man and not a robot.

The man had messy dark hair and large dark eyes along with a scruffy beard. Something about his face was familiar to Bucky. On the man’s hand was a gleaming silver gauntlet of some sort that had a glowing circle in the center of its palm. Or, at least Bucky thought it was a gauntlet. It could have also been metal all the way through like Bucky’s mechanical arm.

Wait. Something was wrong with what he was seeing, more wrong than a random stranger with a metal gauntlet/hand. Bucky squinted. Was there something wrong with his eyes?

A gasp of surprise broke the tense tableau. The man said in a tone of awe, “I can—I can see in—”

And Bucky understood. There wasn’t anything wrong with his eyes. He hadn’t known what to call the difference before, but now he could see in color after a whole lifetime living in grayscale. But before now, Bucky hadn’t even known that there something deficit in his vision.

Of course, he had known in a clinical sense—everyone knew that if you met your soulmate, you would be able to see in color—but he had grown up without color and how do you explain colorblindness to someone without a sense of color anyways? Steve had tried after Bucky had finally shaken off the conditioning and realized his childhood friend had found his own soulmate, but even Steve’s artistic words had been no help.

Fuck. That meant this man standing before them was his soulmate. What were the fucking chances?

“Wait, which one of you is my—”

The stranger’s question was cut off by Sam’s loud cry of pain. Bucky was strangely relieved that he wouldn’t have to immediately confront the fact that he now had a soulmate. He turned to see that Sam had collapsed against Steve and passed out from his wounds.

Bucky watched as the stranger’s eyes widened with the realization that on of their three-man team was seriously injured. The stranger visibly switched gears from the soulmate issue to the there-is-an-injured-man-who-needs-medical-attention issue. He lowered his gauntlet/hand and seemed to power it down. At least, the glowing circle in the center of the palm dimmed. Bucky lowered his weapon, too, though he was still on guard in case he needed to draw it again.

The stranger waved the three of them towards the trap door. “Come on, let’s get inside before we get caught. I have medical supplies downstairs.”

After hearing the magical words “medical supplies”, Steve swung Sam up into his arms as gentle as possible and headed towards the stranger. Still wary, Bucky cut in front of Steve so that he could shield him and Sam if necessary since Steve’s hands were full. Bucky thought the stranger’s offer of help sounded genuine, but it always paid to be careful.

In their travels, Bucky had seen a lot of people keeping their heads down and going about their day like the world hadn’t been taken over by particularly militant kill-bots. Bucky and his friends couldn’t take that sitting down, but he also couldn’t really blame normal civilians for trying to live out their lives. What he could blame people for was actually actively helping the robots. They’d had the misfortune of running into some people who fell into the latter category—fucking traitors to humanity. The fact that this stranger had very similar tech to the robots was highly suspicious. Just because he was apparently Bucky’s soulmate didn’t mean he was safe from suspicion.

The trapdoor sealed with a hiss behind them. The stranger led them into a large underground room, nearly the size of the shop upstairs. Machinery was also scattered around down here, but they looked much newer than the machinery upstairs. Some were even powered on and humming away, doing who knew what. The man led Steve to a cot that he could set Sam down on. Steve thanked him quietly and got Sam situated as comfortably as possible. Bucky remained standing near the entrance for a better view of the entire room so that he could keep watch while Steve tended to Sam.

The stranger rummaged through some closets against the far wall and then pulled out a med pack with a triumphant noise. He brought the kit back over to Steve and together, the two of them sorted through the supplies for gloves, disinfectant, pain pills, needle, thread, and burn cream.

Steve asked, “Do you have anything I could use as a splint?”

“Hmm. Maybe. Let me check.”

The man went off and started rummaging through what looked to Bucky like a pile of junk. He returned with two pieces of piping and a rag. “Here, try this.”

Steve nodded his thanks and got to work. The stranger stood off to one side and watched.

“So…who are you guys?” The man directed the question to Steve, but his eyes kept glancing back to Bucky.

Steve replied without stopping his work on Sam’s wounds. “I’m Steve. This here is Sam. And that over there is James. You?”

Bucky wouldn’t have given their real names, but at least Steve had said James instead of Bucky. Steve, Sam, and James were all fairly common names. Bucky definitely wasn’t.

“Tony.” The man, apparently Tony, replied almost absently. His gaze was focused on the shield Steve was wearing on his back.

At Bucky’s advice, Steve had painted his shield a dull matte black to avoid easy recognition, but some of the original coloring—and wow, Bucky now actually knew what red and blue actually looked like—showed through a few nicks and scrapes. Steve had also stopped wearing his uniform in favor of standard black Kevlar armor.

“Fuck me sideways!” Tony suddenly exclaimed. Before Bucky could wonder too long if they were being hosted by a madman, Tony continued, “I couldn’t see it at first underneath all that grime, but you’re Captain America.” Tony’s eyes swung wildly to Bucky. “And you must be Bucky Barnes. Which, I mean, how? Didn’t you die seventy years ago? I want to say this is all a sleep-dep hallucination, but those are never this real…please tell me I haven’t gone off the deep end and you two are the real deal or at least incredibly accurate fakes.”

Tony finished his speed of light ramble and cast desperately entreating eyes at the both of them. Bucky looked to Steve to see what their next move was. They were wanted men. This wasn’t by far the first time they’d been recognized, but they usually had the option of running out of the area as quickly as possible. It wasn’t going to be pretty if they had to move Sam. They could do it, but who knew how Sam would fare through their getaway?

The other option was to hold Tony hostage until they had to leave. Not that long ago, under the Winter Soldier’s influence, Bucky might have even suggested killing Tony, but Steve would never allow it, even if Bucky were inclined to do so now. But, if Tony was in allegiance with the robots and he checked in regularly with them, they might grow suspicious if he was suddenly out of communication for several weeks.

All of Bucky’s careful considerations became a moot point when Steve said to Tony, “Yes, we’re the real deal.” _Dammit Steve, have you never heard of discretion? Or lying?_ “And you’re Tony Stark, aren’t you? I couldn’t tell at first with the beard instead of the, uh, well, your facial hair used to be a lot more distinctive.” _What?! What the hell was that punk even talking about?_

“Yeah. It’s called a Van Dyke. I used to have it because it was distinctive. But now, you know, robot kill lists.” Tony waved awkwardly above their heads as if they didn’t know there was a fucking robot apocalypse out there.

Bucky impatiently burst out, “What the hell is going on? Who are you? Who’s Tony Stark?”

Tony turned from Steve to Bucky with surprise on his face. “Huh, you don’t know the name Tony Stark? That’s a new one.”

“Wait, wait, wait a minute, Stark as in Howard Stark?”

Tony’s face pinched with a grimace. “Yeah, Howard Stark was my old man.”

Bucky looked more carefully at Tony’s face and he could see the resemblance in the dark eyes full of sparkling wit. The relation also explained the top of the line tech and put Bucky a little more at ease. Being Howard Stark’s son made it more likely the tech was homemade rather than something Tony had gotten as a robot minion.

Tony looked between the two of them and demanded, “Explain how in the world you’re both alive and looking like you haven’t aged a day.”

Steve shrugged and said, “I crashed into the Artic, but I froze instead of dying. The serum kept me alive. The plane I went down was found a few years ago and I was unfrozen. And well, Buck’s story is his to tell. Let’s just say he didn’t actually die when he fell off the train.” Sometimes, Bucky wish he had, especially if this was what he had to wake up to. But then that kind of thinking was uncharitable to Steve, and even Sam. It wasn’t their fault the robots had ruined everything.

Tony looked curiously at Bucky but Bucky stared stoically back. Bucky half expected Tony to push, but the other man turned away after a few more moments of intense eye contact.

Steve asked, “What about you? I thought you died during the Stark Tower attack?”

Tony’s eyes darkened with too many emotions for Bucky to read. “Well, as you can see, I didn’t.” Before the moment could become too weighty and awkward, Tony changed topics. “Who’s that poor guy conked out on my bed? Sam, right? How’d he end up with you two?”

Steve accepted the sudden turn in the conversation gracefully. “When I was in DC, I met him while running and he became my running buddy. He used to be a peer counselor for vets. And how he got from there to here—well, you know about SHIELD, right? Nat said she knew you.”

“Yep, super-secret spy organization, defunct now, but used to be led by a one-eyed pirate. Wait, Nat as in Natalie, or Natasha, whatever she’s calling herself these days? Black Widow?” At Steve’s nod, Tony went on, “Yeah, she spied on me a few years back because of the whole Ironman thing. And she stabbed me in the neck, but I guess I can’t complain too much, since she and Fury kind of helped me save my own life.”

“I used to run missions with her and a STRIKE team. Sometimes, her partner, Clint, codenamed Hawkeye, would join us if we needed a sniper. On one of our routine missions, we discovered something was up with SHIELD. Next thing we knew, Fury had been shot”—Bucky winced—“and Nat, Clint, and I were fugitives according to SHIELD. The STRIKE team we used to work turned out to be Hydra. In fact, half of SHIELD turned out to be Hydra. Sam provided us with shelter and then joined us in invading SHIELD HQ. We tried to stop Project Insight, but they released the robots early, and well, you know the rest. Sam and I got separated from Nat and Clint. Hopefully, they went to ground. We met up with Bucky later.”

“Wow, I don’t even know what to say to that. You were actually there to see it all happen. Christ.”

Steve got defensive and said stiffly, “We tried our best to stop them.”

“Oh no, I’m not blaming you, not at all. Maybe if Project Insight had been one big weapon or three, you might have been able to stop them with just a handful of people. But thousands of robots? Yeah, no, there’s just no way. Especially since they’re all networked with a learning AI. They’re self-maintaining, even self-replicating. Just, no. You can’t blame yourself for that.”

Steve actually relaxed. Bucky was momentarily grateful Tony knew enough about tech to reassure Steve. Bucky knew Steve had been carrying the weight of having been unable to stop the apocalypse before it had started on his shoulders all this time.

“The only way to stop them would be to stop all of them all at once. I briefly considered a virus that they’d spread to each other through the network. But they’re capable of shutting out individual machines from the network. And even worse, their creators gave them the ability to change their code. They can’t change their core directives, but they can create new firewalls.”

Tony looked frustrated, but not hopeless, which in turn gave Bucky the first spark of hope in this whole mess.

Bucky asked, “You think you can find a way?”

“So far, no dice. But I’m working on it.”

Steve and Bucky shared a look of barely banked excitement. They didn’t want to get their hopes up too high, but this was the first good news in a while. At least there was a genius inventor—if Tony was anything like his father—working on the issue. Steve, Bucky, and Sam had been raiding old Hydra bases just in case there might be a clue there in how to stop the robots.

“By the way, you say Hydra made the robots under the codename Project Insight. I couldn’t really take a look at SHIELD’s files because the robots had completely taken over their systems and I didn’t want to risk infecting my own. But, I mean, if they’re Hydra’s, and I presume Hydra made the kill lists?” Tony looked to Steve for confirmation and when Steve nodded, he continued, “Then, I have a lot of questions. Starting with—is Hydra still holding the reins? Because the robots are completely out of control. I mean, aren’t most people on the kill lists dead? Why hasn’t Hydra decommissioned their murder-bots and started shaping the remaining people into their perfect vision of a twisted utopia? Huge chunks of the earth are still in smoking ruins. Like, was this the plan all along? Because I know villains are dumb, but this is just—I have no words.”

After Tony wound down, Steve answered, “Well, as far as we can tell, the robots started adding people to the kill lists who weren’t originally on there without Hydra input. Anybody who tried to fight back was added. At first, we thought Hydra was adding the names or that they intended the robots’ program to behave this way. Then, we started raiding Hydra bases and finding them completely decimated.”

“Wait, what? Why?”

Bucky replied, “We figure, Hydra didn’t intend for the robots to be able to add names by themselves, or maybe they had a change of heart or they didn’t like the parameters. Whatever the reason, they must have tried to change the programming and got targeted themselves. Hydra is gone, its members either dead or deep in hiding.”

Bucky was glad that Hydra was gone. After all the shit it put Bucky through, it deserved everything it got and more. But Bucky felt guilty as all hell that he was capable of feeling grateful to the robots for anything.

Tony sighed noisily, half resigned and half angrily amused. “It’s like none of them watched or read any sci-fi horror stuff about this exact scenario happening. You can’t just make a learning AI meant to kill people without expecting it to learn how to better kill people.”

They all contemplated Hydra’s stupidity in the ensuing silence. Hydra had fucked themselves over, but they’d also taken half the world with them.

The silence was interrupted by Sam’s groan of pain. They all crowded closer to see how Sam was. Bucky abandoned his watch post by the entrance since he figured, if this Tony was someone Steve knew as one of the good guys, then the man could probably be trusted.  

Sam’s eyes fluttered open.

Before Steve could say anything, Tony said, “So, I guess you’re my soulmate.”

 _What?!_ The ringing in the silence made Bucky realize that he, along with Steve and Sam, had shouted the exclamation/question (though Sam more croaked it than anything).

Tony looked taken aback by their unanimous response. “What? I can now see in color. That’s definitely not a hallucination.” _Did this man hallucinate a lot? That seemed to be the first assumption he always had to eliminate when explaining weird phenomenon._ “There’s no way anyone can imagine colors if they’ve never seen them before. So that means one of you three is my soulmate. Steve and Bucky are together. And even if they’re not, neither of them reacted or said anything about colors when we met. Sam immediately passed out so he’s the only one with an excuse for keeping mum.”

Steve was the first to recover. “Bucky and I are definitely not together. You think I would have agreed to wear that colorful monstrosity of a uniform in the middle of war if I hadn’t been colorblind?” Sam snorted in amusement. “Sam and I are soulmates. I guess this means you and Buck are soulmates now, too.” Steve glared at Bucky for not telling them earlier.

“Oh my god,” Tony squeaked, face a bright embarrassed red, “I’m so sorry.”

Bucky didn’t want to find Tony’s embarrassed face endearing, but he somehow couldn’t stop himself. This soulmate stuff was just too much.

Steve’s glare intensified, as if to say, _well, what do you have to say for yourself, mister?_

It was unfair that seventy years and Hydra brainwashing wasn’t enough to make Bucky immune to Steve’s looks. He answered helplessly, “We had bigger concerns. Sam needed treatment and then we were discussing Hydra and the killer bots.”

Tony had finally returned to a more normal color when he said, “Okay, I can accept that. But you totally owe me one.”

“Uh, sure.”

Bucky didn’t know how to act around his soulmate. Steve and Sam had hit it off immediately. But they had bonded while running for fun in a park. Now they were all in the middle of a robot apocalypse. Was this really the time for romance?

Sam croaked, “Does anyone have water?”

Steve helped him lift his head to drink the last of the water from the canteen.

“Hey, I have more if you need it. I mean, the supply isn’t limitless, but I’ve set up a system to collect rain water and filter it, so I’ve got some to spare.”

Steve passed the empty canteen to Tony. “Thanks for all your help.”

“Eh, it’s no problem.” Tony said as he left to go fill it up.

Sam asked, “Wait, wasn’t that Tony Stark? He’s alive? And we happened to run into him? And he happens to be Bucky’s soulmate? What are the chances?”

Steve laughed and filled Sam in on what he had missed while he’d been unconscious.

Tony came back with the canteen of water and then grabbed a few food packages from a cabinet. He set his haul gently on the bed away from Sam’s injuries.

“Just MRE’s and protein bars, but better than nothing.”

“Where’d you get MRE’s?” Sam asked as he grabbed a protein bar and passed another to Steve.

“I raided a military supply warehouse for some parts I needed and had the fortune to stumble on several crates of the stuff.”

“Military parts? For what?” Bucky asked.

Tony had gone into hiding and bunkered down. He had a pretty decent setup here. It wasn’t like he was on the run like the other three men. So he didn’t really need weapons or ammo.

“Oh, well, I need to capture robots to study them, but the only way I’m any match for one is in my suit. And my suit needs a lot of specialty tools and materials. The Stark Tower attack destroyed all of my suits and also the workshop that I used to make them.”

“Suits?” Bucky was even more confused now.

“Ironman suits? That doesn’t ring a bell? Wow, okay, you’ve never heard of that or my name. Were you unfrozen less than a year ago?” Tony asked incredulously.

Bucky replied woodenly, “Yes, in a manner of speaking.”

Tony winced. “Oh. Uh. Sorry. I just keep putting my foot in my mouth, don’t I?”

Bucky shrugged. “It’s alright. Can I see what the suit looks like? Do you have a picture?”

Tony smirked. “I’ve got something even better.”

Tony moved to the center of the room and held out his arms. Bucky wondered what he was doing. “FRIDAY, suit me up.”

“You got it, boss.” A chipper voice rang out, seemingly from the walls.

Bucky startled. Was there someone else here? Where was she? In a secret room?

Seeing everyone’s searching glances, Tony explained, “That’s FRIDAY, my AI.”

Mechanical parts started zooming towards Tony from different worktop tables. Bucky was worried the speedily moving hunks of metal were going to maim Tony or worse, but they latched onto his body and started forming a suit seamlessly. Bucky watched in awe. Then, the faceplate slammed down and the whole ensemble was complete, and Bucky’s awe turned into horror. Tony’s Ironman suit looked almost exactly like the robots, with the glowing eyes and the glowing circles embedded in the chest and palms.

Tony’s faceplate popped back up. He was beaming as he asked, “So, what do you think?”

Bucky asked flatly, “If your suit came before the robots, then why does it look like them?”

Tony’s bright expression immediately blanked. “That’s because the robots are based off of Ironman. Their creators stole my arc reactor tech and suit designs.”

“So, you’re saying the reason we’re in this mess right now is because of you?”

Steve’s sharp reprimand of “Buck!” barely even broke through the fury shaking through Bucky.

Bucky turned to Steve and snapped, pointing at Tony, “No, if he hadn’t made Ironman or maybe just kept a better eye on his tech, none of this would have happened. I know for a fact Hydra wasn’t at the level of making intelligent robots. Because if they were, they’d have stopped needing me ages ago. And he’s got an AI. Maybe they stole that, too.”

“You used to work for Hydra? You’ve got a lot of nerve pointing fingers with that kind of past!”

Bucky’s face turned white at the mention of Hydra. He gritted out, “Don’t speak of what you know nothing about!”

“Oh yeah? I could say the same to you. You—”

“Enough!” Steve barked as he pushed them apart—and huh, when did they get so close?—and stepped in between them. “Both of you stop it. This is no way to treat your soulmate.”

“Soulmate?” Bucky scoffed. “I’d rather get my other arm chopped off than bond with him.”

The quality of the silence in the room after Bucky’s words was like the aftermath of an atom bomb—shocked stillness, with horror and pain soon to follow. The devastation in Tony’s eyes could have filled a wasteland. Steve was staring at him in disbelief.

Bucky felt guilty, but he was still angry. He didn’t know how to deal with this, so he turned on his heel and headed for the exit, with nothing in his mind except _get out, get away from here_.

“You can’t leave!” Tony cried out. “It’s too dangerous to go outside for no reason.”

Bucky said shortly without turning around, “Your supplies aren’t going to last forever. I’ll go get more.”

Steve piped up, “I’ll go with you.”

Bucky hated this. The itchy feeling under skin was only going to get worse if he didn’t get out of here, but Bucky felt like the worst kind of friend to drag Steve away from his injured soulmate just because he was in a snit.

Tony took a deep breath and let it out in a resigned sigh, “Okay, fine. I’ve got enough food and water, but there is something I need. A robot’s central core. I have one that I dug out of a robot a few weeks ago, but they’ve probably been through several iterations of updates by now, so I need a new one.”

Steve said, “Sure, we can get one. What does it look like?”

Bucky let Steve hash it out with Tony. He went up the stairs and waited by the closed trapdoor. A few minutes later, Steve showed up with a bulging pack and his shield. Tony called out an all clear and the trapdoor opened. They went through and headed out of the building’s back door.

When they were outside, Bucky asked, “You trust him with Sam?”

Steve shot him a quelling look. “Regardless of whether Tony is trustworthy, Sam would kick your ass for suggesting he couldn’t hold his own.”

Bucky looked away. Steve was right.

Steve sighed and started pulling out something out of the pack. He showed Bucky a clear screen which he turned on. “Tony gave us schematics of the robots. He took one apart and mapped out its innards. This will help us find the central core and remove it without damaging it. The device also comes with a tracker so we’ll know if there are any robots to hunt nearby, and communications capability so we can keep him and Sam updated on our progress.”

Bucky took the device and studied the schematics before toggling to the tracker. Hmm. Nothing so far.

Bucky gestured to the pack. “What else did he give you?”

“Water. A few protein bars. A box with shielding inside it to put the central core in which will make sure we’re not tracked when we bring it back to Tony’s base. And a localized jammer so our target robot can’t report to the network that we’re trying to steal its central core. Oh, and a device that will superheat the robot after we’re done with it and melt it into slag to cover our tracks. Tony really doesn’t want the robots to figure out he’s stealing central cores to try to figure out how they work. He thinks that if they do, they’ll overhaul their own systems so any solution he tries to implement won’t work.”

Bucky’s eyebrows raised, reluctantly impressed. He pointed to the pack. “And all of that fits in there?”

“Yeah, I was pretty surprised myself when he explained what all of it’s supposed to do.”

Bucky checked the tracker again. “There’s nothing nearby. Should we head towards the inner city?”

Steve nodded in agreement and they proceeded to spend the next half hour making great speed towards their goal in companionable silence.

Steve broke the silence, saying, “Buck, what you said to Tony back there…”

Bucky sighed. “Yeah, yeah, I know. I didn’t really mean the arm thing.”

“Okay, that’s good. But you gotta apologize. I can’t even imagine how I’d feel if Sam had told me that before we bonded.”

Bucky felt even guiltier. “But you and Sam are, well, you and Sam, you know? Not everyone is as perfect as you two are together.”

“Well, Sam is a real swell guy and I do think our bond is special, but that doesn’t mean I think nobody else can find their Sam and have their own special bond. I honestly don’t think Tony is a bad guy. Blaming him for the state of the world now is like blaming Hitler’s ma for the Holocaust. I could be wrong, but I highly doubt Tony gave his tech to Hydra. Nat told me Tony wouldn’t even hand over his suit to Congress. Or SHIELD. In fact, given his history with people taking his tech, he doesn’t strike me as the guy who would be careless with it.”

Now Bucky felt like he was buried under an entire mountain of guilt.

“Look, I don’t want to make you feel bad.” At Bucky’s sardonic look, Steve smiled sheepishly. “Okay, maybe a little bad. But the fact is, you’re both missing pretty much the entirety of each other’s backstories. He doesn’t know about the Winter Soldier. And you don’t know about Ironman. Just give him a chance, okay? And let him take a chance on you.”

That last bit hit the nail on the head. Something in Bucky’s face must have given him away because Steve sighed. Bucky cringed. That was Steve’s oh-Bucky sigh.

“I know it’s hard for you to believe, but you deserve to be happy.”

Bucky said mulishly, “I don’t need a soulmate to be happy.”

“That’s true, but having a soulmate is indescribable. Having a bond…just, before I met Sam, I had Nat and Clint, but I still felt lost and alone in the twenty-first century. Meeting Sam changed that. I know you’ve got me. And Sam. But just, think about it, okay?”

“Fine.”

Steve sighed again but let it drop. That nosy ass punk was sure sighing a lot lately. Bucky knew better than to think the matter was completely closed. Stevie would probably bide his time and then spring it on him when he was least expecting it unless if he apologized to Tony and then fell into happy soulmated bliss in short order. Yeah, sure, sounded easy as pie. Bucky was going to get right on that after they tracked down a robot and stole its brain.

The screen suddenly lit up and informed them that there was a robot within a mile radius. The hunt was on.

Bucky grinned at Steve, blood already pumping, “You and me, just like old times.”

Steve shook his head and laughed. “I don’t know what old times you’re thinking of, Buck, but I sure don’t remember any robots.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After some more writing and thinking, I realized the second part was large enough to split into two. So, here's the second part with a third and final part coming soon!

Bucky and Steve returned, sweaty but victorious, with a robot core in the shielded box, and were let in through the trapdoor by Tony’s AI. As they walked down the stairs, they heard Tony’s voice and Sam’s laughter. At the bottom of the stairs, they saw Tony presumably telling a story with wildly gesturing hands. Bucky tried not to notice the grace in those hands or the captivating brightness in those eyes. Well, he tried. Dammit.

Sam clapped when Tony finished his story. Tony radiated smug pleasure at having made his guest laugh. Having reached a natural lull in their conversation, Tony and Sam both looked towards the returning supersoldiers and called out their greetings. Steve cheerfully returned the greetings while Bucky simply gruffly nodded in acknowledgement.

Tony’s eyes almost seemed to twinkle when Tony saw the box Steve was holding. “You got it? Awesome! How did it go?”

Tony stopped babbling to make grabby hands for the box. Steve chuckled at Tony’s antics and handed over the box.

“Buck and I make a great team. Wasn’t too much trouble to isolate one. Your tracker was swell. Really made everything much easier. Actually, all of your tech was aces.”

“Thanks. Glad you liked all of it. Stark tech was popular for a reason, you know. I may not have Stark Industries anymore, but I’m still me. You think that pack of goodies was awesome, you haven’t seen anything yet!” Tony beamed with genuine pride at his tech.

Bucky wanted to make a quip about modesty and the size of Tony’s ego, but they were on shaky enough ground as it was. Besides, Steve wasn’t exaggerating. Tony’s tech had worked like a dream.

Tony opened the box and pulled out the core. He inspected it with sharp eyes for any potential damages. “Looks good. I’ll check to see if everything is in working order.” He looked up at Steve, but his eyes already looked far away as if he was running calculations in his mind. “Hey, thanks for taking a big risk and getting this for me.”

Steve said, “It was no problem. You’re doing a big favor by letting us stay here and use up your supplies. Besides, it was for a good cause—if you actually manage to figure out how the robots tick and come up with a working plan to stop them once and for all…just, good luck.”

 Tony rubbed the back of his neck. “Wow. No pressure. I’m just, uh, going to go work on this. Don’t mind me for the next however long it takes to figure this out. I’ll probably check out from the rest of the world. You guys are welcome to anything in here. Mi casa es su casa. Or, well, underground bunker, in this case.”

Tony kind of ambled off after that, his attention already on the tech in his hands. He carried the core and shielded box over to a worktop along the far wall. He tossed the box to one side and set the core on the worktop.

Tony called out in a brisk tone, “FRIDAY, open up a new server for me. Lock it down tighter than Fort Knox. Protocol Xerox, Fry. Zero-delta-eight-epsilon. Protocol Great Wall. Alpha-mu-seven-seven.”

“You got it, boss. Initiating Protocol Xerox in three, two, one.” Tony started pulling out tool in the ensuing silence. After a minute or two, FRIDAY spoke again, “Rebooting. Initializing Protocol Great Wall in three, two, one.” Another pause. “Protocol Great Wall up and running.”

“Thanks, Fry, now show me what’s inside this baby.”

Tony and FRIDAY continued to trade words that went over the other three men’s heads. Tony in his element was a sight to behold. He was so sure and confident almost like he was putting on a performance, but his intense focus showed that he was in his own world. Nothing else existed outside of the core and his AI helper.

Bucky asked Sam and Steve, “Do you know what he just did? What were all those protocols that enacted before he started working on the core?”

Steve shook his head, which Bucky expected, but Sam answered, “They’re safety precautions. I asked what he was going to do to ensure that the programming in the core didn’t infect his AI. Protocol Xerox copies FRIDAY into a bank of secure hard drives completely off the network. This way if something goes wrong or if Tony’s bunker is discovered, Tony can take the bank and run and set up FRIDAY somewhere else exactly as she is. It’s amazing how Tony has managed to create synthetic life.”

Bucky asked, “You think FRIDAY’s alive? What makes her different from the Insight AI?”

Sam replied, “Well, if she’s not alive, at least she is an incredible approximation to life. She’s got a personality, opinions, and all that. It might all be code, but it’s definitely a far superior code to Insight. All those robots live and die by their lists, and their one true purpose is killing.”

Steve teased, “Should I be jealous?”                                                                               

“Alas, code can’t cuddle.”

Bucky interrupted before the happy couple could devolve into kisses and sweet whisperings—he loved them both, but just no—“And Protocol Great Wall?”

“Well, that one makes it so that FRIDAY is completely shut out of all the physical mechanisms in the bunker. Apparently, Tony has defensive weapons hidden and scattered all over the place. This bunker is a veritable fortress. FRIDAY is also isolated from the outside world, the Insight core, and her own copy. She’s basically reduced to note-taking capabilities in this mode. This way, on the off chance she gets infected, she can’t turn against us.”

Steve said, impressed, “Wow, it sounds like Tony’s thought of everything.”

Sam nodded. “Yeah, that is one paranoid dude. But given his past, I don’t blame him.”

“What happened in his past?” Bucky asked, curious in spite of himself.

Sam glanced at Tony, still buried in his work all the way across the room. “Well, all this is pretty much public knowledge, so…anyway, Stark Industries used to be the biggest weapons contractor in the U.S. A few years ago, Tony got kidnapped in Afghanistan and tortured by the Ten Rings terrorists to get him to build them a bomb. He created the arc reactor and the first Iron Man suit in that cave.”

Tony’s story of captivity and consequent escape resonated with Bucky against all the scars left there by Hydra.

Steve added, “Nat told me that the arc reactor used to be embedded in his chest because it kept shrapnel from shredding his heart. He got it removed not long before Project Insight.”

It sounded like there were more similarities between Bucky and his soulmate than he had originally thought.

Sam said, “Bucky, you really got to apologize to the guy.”

Bucky grumbled, “Yeah, I know, I know. Stevie already got on my case about it. Once Tony’s ready to take a break from his work, I’ll do it.”

Sam insisted, “No, it’s got to be more than a reluctant apology. What you said to him really struck a nerve. He told me that you were right about Project Insight being his fault.”

Steve and Bucky instantly snapped to attention.

Bucky asked, “What do you mean?”

Sam explained, “He kept his Iron Man suits on lockdown. The servers he kept his schematics on were buried deep beneath Stark Tower. He wouldn’t have lost a suit, not even a single piece, or any of the related schematics. The only suit he ever let out of his sight was one he gave to his most-trusted, oldest friend, a Colonel James Rhodes. That suit was dubbed War Machine.”

Steve let out a soft wounded sound of understanding at the mention of War Machine. Bucky didn’t understand. Did Hydra steal the suit from Rhodes?

Sam continued for Bucky’s edification, “Rhodes used it to fly missions for the Air Force. It was reported that he was shot down in foreign airspace and the suit had been blasted into pieces too small to collect. Tony checked out the site of his friend’s death and found nothing suspicious, so he accepted the report, grieved, and moved on. He told me that after Project Insight went down, he started to suspect that Hydra, under the guise of Air Force, SHIELD, or who knew what, had faked the whole thing in order to get their hands on the suit. That’s where the robots come from. He feels like shit because he thinks his decision to trust his friend with his greatest invention and weapon is the reason his friend is dead and the world is in ruins.”

Bucky sat stone still in a wash of horror. Christ. And Bucky had thrown that blame in Tony’s face so easily without knowing any of this. Bucky itched with the desire to immediately apologize for his ignorance, but Tony was still busy. His work was important, possibly world-saving. Bucky didn’t want to interrupt and accidentally wreck something.

After a little bit more idle conversation, Sam dropped off into an exhausted and healing sleep. Then, Steve and Bucky had a silent debate with their eyes about who was going to take first watch while the other caught up on much needed rest. Bucky finally made the case that if Steve was well-rested, Sam would feel it through their bond and it would help Sam heal. Steve was one stubborn punk, but he was a marshmallow when it came to his soulmate.

They technically didn’t need a lookout. FRIDAY was more than capable of alerting them if anything was going on outside of the bunker. Besides, Bucky didn’t think Tony was going to murder them all in their sleep. Even if Tony was so inclined, it didn’t look like the engineering haze was going to leave his eyes anytime soon.

Since Bucky didn’t need to watch for danger, he watched Tony. Even though Tony was wearing drab clothing and sporting an uneven beard, something about him drew the eye. He was so full of life you could see it bubbling behind his eyes. And where there was life, there was hope. Bucky could use a little bit of hope is his life after a dearth of it for so long.

 

 

 

 

On the second day, Tony finally pulled away from working on the central core long enough to take a real break. In between gulping down water and scarfing down an MRE, he explained in an incomprehensible long stream of words about his amazing discoveries. Even though the other three men didn’t understand a word, Tony was undeterred. Bucky watched on, amazed by how Tony didn’t seem to need to breathe.

After Tony subsided to focus more on eating, Bucky cleared his throat awkwardly. He froze when three pairs of eyes swung to meet his. At Steve’s encouraging look, he asked gruffly, “Tony, could I talk to you. Alone.” The flatness of his voice managed to make his questions sound like statements.

Tony put his food down warily and, after a brief moment’s hesitation, nodded. He followed Bucky to a far corner.

“Okay, what do you want to talk about? Is it something bad? I feel like whenever someone asks to talk to me alone, it’s always something bad. Like, I feel like I’m in trouble. Did I do something wrong?” Here, Tony’s babble cut off and he added bitterly, “Well, more wrong than everything you accused me of.”

Bucky winced. “Yeah, I, uh, wanted to apologize.”

Tony seemed surprised before he nodded and said, “Okay.”

They stared at each other before Bucky remembered that he needed to do more than offer such a paltry apology and said, “I didn’t know anything about you and I was hasty in making judgments. Steve and Sam set me straight. I shouldn’t have lashed out at you like that.”

Something softened in Tony’s demeanor. “Well, um, alright. I already said okay, but, uh, let’s make it official. Apology accepted.” Tony grinned self-deprecatingly. “Anyway, don’t get too worked up about it, okay? You wouldn’t be the first to think the worst of me. In fact, most people make snap judgments about me much faster than you did.”

That did little to make Bucky feel better. In fact, it somehow made him feel worse. Deciding he was the last person who should chide another on low self-esteem, he decided to move on to the second part of his apology. “And I’m sorry for saying I’d rather chop my other arm off than bond with you. That was unnecessarily cruel and untrue.”

“That was pretty harsh, thanks for admitting that.”

Even though the words were sincere, Bucky sensed a ‘but’ in there. “But?”

Tony seemed to be debating with himself about whether to reply or not. He took a deep breath, and after he let it out, said, “The part about you cutting your arm off, well, that part was untrue. I figured as much. But you don’t want to bond with me. Now that part _is_ true.”

Bucky felt trapped by Tony’s words. Unsure of what to do, he shot back defensively, “And you’re telling me that you would be fine bonding now?”

Tony met Bucky’s challenge head on. “Now, no. But before I showed you my suit? Yes.”

Bucky was speechless. Tony’s honesty felt like a thousand spears of accusation piercing his heart.

Sensing Bucky’s distress, Tony backed down. “Now I’m not saying that if you ever wanted to bond in the future and you asked, I’d say no for sure—look, me saying no now isn’t a permanent moratorium on bonding. We’re both clearly not in the right headspace for this right now. And, I mean, we’re in the middle of a robot apocalypse, so this isn’t really the time for it, anyway. We can bench this discussion for after we save the world, okay?”

Bucky nodded numbly. Taking his nod as a sign that their talk was over, Tony headed to his work table and went back to work. After a moment, Bucky wandered back to his friends. Steve looked like he was burning with curiosity, but subsided at a gentle touch and look from Sam. Bucky watched the point of contact between their hands with some unnamable feeling lodged in his throat.

 

 

 

 

Their motley crew of four fell into some semblance of a routine over the next few days and weeks. Tony stayed up for days at a time working on cracking the Insight programming. Sam stayed in bed recuperating and waiting patiently for his leg to heal. Steve and Bucky were the ones who were always haring to leap back into danger before their injuries healed even though their healing rate far surpassed that of normal humans. Bucky sometimes wondered if Sam’s sensibility was the reason they were still alive.

While Tony and Sam stayed holed up in the bunker, Steve and Bucky went out on supply runs at Tony’s behest. Tony asked them to steal central cores several more times over the next few weeks. He was carefully tracking the updates, trying to predict how the robots were evolving. Bucky and Steve were also sent out to pick up parts for computers and whatever else Tony needed.

Tony’s and Buck’s relationship also became routine, in that there wasn’t much of one. They were civil towards each other—and it wasn’t the kind of civility with thinly veiled hostility underneath, so at least there was that—but they never reached a true rapport, not with the bond a giant pink elephant firmly between them. Tony had quickly warmed up to Sam and Steve, so the latter two acted as a sort of buffer whenever all four of them ended up together talking over meals.

Two months into their stay at Tony’s bunker, Sam’s leg was almost completely healed. He was able to walk around the bunker under his own strength again. Whenever Sam got up out of bed, Steve hovered near him ready to catch him at a moment’s notice. Sam treated Steve’s mother-henning with good humor, which was more than could be said when their situations were reversed and Steve was the one injured.

When Tony saw Sam walking around, he clapped his hands together and declared, “Good, you’re all fixed up. We’re going to need all the manpower available.”

Steve looked up from where he was not so discretely fretting over Sam and asked, “For what?”

“I’ve made all the progress that I can with what I have here. I need some specialty parts that I can’t build here. Or, well, I could, but that would take way too long. Now, if this was my old workshop where I could get whatever I needed with a simple phone call…well, you get the idea.”

“Is whatever you need us to get too big or heavy for just Bucky and I to carry?” Steve asked, puzzled.

“Um, no, the parts are actually quite small. They used to be manufactured by Stark Industries. Actually, that’s kind of part of the problem. I know exactly where they’re stored, but anything with my name on it is heavily guarded these days.”

Bucky’s eyes narrowed. “And exactly how heavily guarded are we talking here?”

Tony looked like he was going to hem and haw some more but Bucky’s glare dissuaded him. He sighed and went over to his work table to pull up some images. “I managed to hack into a satellite. Couldn’t stay long or the robots would have caught me and probably figured out what I was after, which meant they would had amped up the security even more. As it is, it’s pretty bad.”

Tony flipped through the images quickly. Each one increased Bucky’s dawning sense of horror. The facility was crawling with robot guards. And that was just the outside. There were probably dozens more inside.

“And you want us to break into there? Are you crazy?”

Tony raised his hands in a placating manner. “I know, I know, but I’m so close. I think I’ve almost managed to crack the pattern of their upgrades. My solution has to be completely airtight. Otherwise, the robots might evolve past it, or it might work, but if even one robot manages to remain undestroyed, it can manufacture more. The Insight programming needs to be completely eradicated. To do that, I need more than what I have here. I’m sorry, I wish I was able to figure it out, but I guess even my purported genius isn’t enough. Please, I’m sorry to ask, but I don’t know what else to do.”

As Tony spoke, Bucky could sense Tony’s increasing desperation until Tony was practically pleading with Bucky for understanding, for forgiveness. Tony knew what he was asking, knew the enormity of it. This was the kind of mission that they might not all walk away from. But wasn’t that what they did—rush headlong into danger, knowing that any day might be their last, all for the greater good? And though Tony had stayed in the safety of his bunker while he had sent Steve and Bucky out, his task had certainly not been easy. They had all watched Tony work day and night, tirelessly and selflessly. Tony thought he was asking too much, but he really wasn’t.

Bucky nodded. “Alright, if you think this’ll you get you closer to ridding the world of robots, then I’m in.”

Steve said, “Count me in, too.”

Sam added quickly, “And where those two knuckleheads go, I’m going, too.”

Tony looked relieved and moved by their quick agreement. “Okay, awesome, thanks.” His expression turned gleeful as he rubbed his hands together like a cartoon villain. “Now here’s the best part: I’ve got gifts for all of you.”

Sam asked, “Gifts?”

Tony brought them over to a different work table. “Well, whenever FRIDAY was running simulations, I had some downtime. I was too wired to sleep, so I decided to work on some upgrades for you guys.”

Tony handed Steve an arm guard with two plates of metal embedded in its surface. “Here, this will call back your shield back if something knocks it out of its return trajectory.”

Steve accepted the new piece of equipment with murmured thanks and immediately set to testing it.

The next thing Tony grabbed defied Bucky’s explanation. He handed them to Sam and explained, “They’re leg exoskeletons. I know your leg is mostly healed, but just in case. They increase your speed and strength exponentially. I based them off my armor, but the full shielding would have been too heavy without the arc reactor powering them. This way you’ll be able to keep up with us.”

“Us?” Bucky asked.

Tony turned to Bucky with a raised eyebrow. “Of course, us. What, did you think I was going to send the three of you off to risk your lives without also planning to do the same?” He snorted and shook his head. “You don’t think much of me, do you?”

Bucky hurried to explain, “No, that’s not it at all! I just thought, since you’re the only one who has any hope of stopping the robots, if something goes wrong on our end, you could still continue your work.”

Tony said sheepishly, “Oh, right. Well, I have to come with you anyway to get through my own defenses on the facility. The robots have undoubtedly altered them, added their own, or both. No offense but you guys don’t have the tech know-how to get through them on your own.”

“This is amazing!” Sam exclaimed, causing Tony and Bucky to look away from each other and back towards Sam.

While Tony and Bucky had been talking, Sam had put on the exoskeleton leg armor. He light bent his knees and jumped, easily reaching the high ceiling. Bucky watched in amazement as Sam ran from one end of the room to another at super soldier speeds without breaking a sweat.

Sam, laughing with delight, told Tony, “If only I had owned a pair of these when I had first met Steve. Then, he wouldn’t have been running laps around me.” He turned to Steve and taunted, “Now it’s gonna be my turn to say ‘on your left’.”

Steve was clearly impressed and happy for his soulmate, but then he put on a mock-boastful expression and retorted, “In your wildest dreams, Wilson. Your new tech is no match for my serum.”

Tony interjected, “Well, it’s _my_ tech, so we’ll see about that.” Turning to Sam, he said, “I’m glad you like them.”

“Like them? Are you kidding me? I _love_ them!”

Bucky said in a joking tone, “Steve, better watch out, first FRIDAY and now this—Sam might throw you over for Stark tech.”

FRIDAY chimed in, “Thank you, Mr. Wilson, for your kind regard, but I’m a one man kind of girl.”

Tony praised, “Thatta girl.”

FRIDAY continued, “Though, perhaps, with a few additional servers, there might be enough empty spaces in my code for another man. Or three.”

Tony muttered “Traitor” to the sound of the other three men’s laughter.

Steve asked, “So, you got anything for Bucky?”

Tony pulled out a truly beautiful machine and handed it to Bucky. “Assault rifle with sniper capabilities. It’s arc reactor run so no need to reload. How’s it feel?”

Bucky checked over the gun. After he was finished, he replied breathlessly, “Amazing.”

Sam chortled, “Oh no, you’ll never get rid of Bucky now. He’s got a hard on for guns like you wouldn’t believe.”

Tony said, watching Bucky practically caressing his new gun, “Oh I believe it.”

Bucky looked up, a faint blush high on his cheeks, and said after clearing his throat, “Sorry. It’s just, I haven’t ever had a gun made specifically for me. For last few months, I’ve had to make do with whatever weapon we scavenged.”

“I haven’t made guns in a while, not since Stark Industries got out of the weapons business, but I’m actually pretty proud of that baby.”

Bucky said with utmost sincerity, “Thank you.”

“Oh, don’t thank me yet. There’s still more gifts.”

“More?” All three of them asked.

“Yep.” Tony explained as he distributed more tech. “Handguns. Grenades. Communicators. Visors with HUDs. These’ll track the movements of robots and humans alike.”

With each new piece of tech Tony gave them, they made the appropriate noises of appreciation, and Tony beamed like he had swallowed the sun.

Sam said, “I can’t believe you worked on these while simultaneously working on the central core.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say simultaneously. I mean, when FRIDAY was number-crunching, I wasn’t doing much anyway.”

Steve said, “Just accept the praise, Tony. These are great.”

Tony tried to hide his small pleased smile. He said deadpan, “Well, they have Captain America’s stamp of approval, so they must be great. My life is complete.”

Steve shook his head in disapproval, but everyone could tell he was amused.

“Alright, everyone suit up. We’re leaving in five.”

 

 

 

 

Before they had left the bunker, Tony had shown them another invention of his that was crucial to their success. He had created little spherical balls that were powerful localized jammers by themselves, but that could form a large jammer field if arrayed in a circle and activated all at once. After explaining, Tony had distributed the jammers to each of them equally.

Now, Bucky was shoving the last of the jammers assigned to him into the dirt. He reported, “Done.”

He received a confirmation from Cap. Shortly after, the other three men also reported that they were done with their portion of the task.

Cap asked, “Everyone in position?” After receiving affirmatives, he ordered, “Alright, Iron Man, give us a count and turn them on. We’ll all close in on his mark.”

“Roger that. Jammers activated in three, two, one, mark.”

Bucky sprang into action and started running at full tilt towards the facility. In the distance, he heard the sound of Iron Man’s repulsors and the clang of the Captain’s shield. He was coming in from the east and the robots in his quadrant, having just sensed him, started gliding toward him. He raised the masterpiece of a gun Tony had created for him and watched with vindictive glee as energy pulses tore apart the robot’s heads.

Bucky was almost disappointed when he fired one last shot and looked around to find that there were no more robots to kill within his sightlines.

“Done with my quadrant.”

Cap instructed, “Winter, go around and meet up with Iron Man. Protect him while he tries to gain entry to the facility. Falcon and I will stay out here in case any robots try to breach the perimeter line to call for backup. We’ll secure our exit. Good luck.”

“Roger that. See you on the flip side.”

Bucky hurried over to Iron Man’s position. Iron Man had one of his gauntlets off so that his hand were free to work the device he had connected to the keypad next to a set of reinforced double doors. Bucky assumed the device was some kind of codebreaker of invented by Tony.

The sealed doors suddenly popped open with a hiss. Iron Man made a small noise of victory and put his gauntlet back on.

Iron Man turned to Bucky. “Ready?”

Bucky looked into glowing slits of Iron Man’s emotionless mask, imagining Tony’s determined eyes behind the faceplate, and nodded an affirmative. Together, they pushed open the unlocked doors and sprinted inside.

Despite never having practiced together, they fought well together. When one turned left, the other immediately turned right to cover his six. When one went in close for the punch, the other stayed far for the distance shot. They circled around each other, never straying too far out of the other’s reach.

Though Bucky was shooting nonstop, with a few well-placed punches and kicks for good measure, he was still able to devote a small corner of his mind to admiring the beauty of the Iron Man suit and the genius of the man inside it. Even though the suit bore a remarkable resemblance to the robots, or rather, the robots mimicked the suit—there was a world of difference between the two. The Iron Man suit benefitted from the remarkable mind of its pilot. Even though many of halls looked too narrow for any kind of flying maneuvers, Iron Man managed with beauty and grace.

Occasionally, they had to stop for Tony to break through another electronic security barrier. Bucky supposed they could have brute-forced their way through, but considering how fast Tony was at cracking codes, punching or repulsoring their way through would have actually taken longer.

As they got deeper into the facility, they had to wade through an ever increasing number of robots. On the comms, they could also hear Cap and Falcon struggling with keeping the robots within the circle of jammers. Where the hell were all the robots coming from? They must have been stacked right on top each other normally to fit inside the facility.

“Shit!” That was Falcon’s voice. “Fuck, I let one get too far. I’ve shot it down now but it definitely got over the line.”

“Falcon, that wasn’t your fault,” came Cap’s gruff reply. “Winter, Iron Man, what’s your progress? How close are you?”

Iron Man replied, frustration evident in his voice, “Location wise, we’ve got one last door. But we’ve hit a stalemate. They’ve formed a phalanx. Winter and I can’t get past the last two hundred feet.”

Cap said, “Okay, Falcon and I will join you. We’ll worry about our exit later.”

The other three men made noises of assent.

Ten minutes later, Bucky heard Cap’s and Falcon’s running footsteps. In the meantime, Bucky and Iron Man had made little progress on the robot barricade. It seemed like as soon as one went down, another took its place.

With Cap’s and Falcon’s help, the robots were slowly beat back, but not before the men suffered some energy burns. Iron Man was protected by his armor but the suit was looking a little dinged up and singed as well. They finally reached the door. Iron Man went to work on the security as the other three men circled him, each facing a different direction to fend off the encroaching robots.

Iron Man finally got the door open and was promptly blasted backwards by a robot inside. Bucky shot it several times in the head by reflex before checking on Iron Man. To his relief, Iron Man was mostly unscathed, and proved it by springing back up. The four men rushed inside the room after taking care of the few robots scattered around inside, while also keeping an eye on the numerous robots out in the halls. Iron Man shut the door with a resounding slam.

Iron Man said in between breaths, “Okay, that should hold them off for a little while. But they’ll either figure out the new code I set or just blast their way in. We have two minutes max.”

Iron Man surveyed the room with purpose. It was some kind of storage room with shelves upon shelves.

After checking one shelf, Iron Man swore lowly, “The organization system has been shot to hell. It could be anywhere now.

Cap set his shield on his magnetic arm brace and asked calmly, “Alright, we’ll all look together. What are we looking for?”

An image suddenly popped up on Bucky’s visor. Bucky assumed the same had happened with Cap and Falcon. Bucky looked at all the shelves with a dawning sense of horror. Shit. They had two minutes. Probably less.

All four men immediately set upon the shelves to start searching. To make their search even more harrowing was the booming and clanging sounds of the robots trying to break in. Just when they had searched a little over half of the room, a crack appeared in one of the walls. Bucky kept searching while keeping one eye on the ever-widening crack. The crack turned into a hole, through which a metal hand came punching through. The hand gripped at the wall and started tearing.

By the time the hole became big enough for Bucky to start shooting through it at the robots behind it without making the hole wider himself, the four men had finished searching the room.

Iron Man muttered, panic and desperation in his voice, “No, no, no. It has to be here.”

Though Cap and Falcon were trying to remain calm, it was obvious they were feeling the strain themselves. They were clearly all thinking the same thing. Had they came all this way in vain? Were they about to give their lives for something that wasn’t even here to begin with?

Iron Man suddenly shouted, “Wait, did someone find a locked box like a safe?”

Bucky and Cap shook their heads in the negative, but Falcon joyously answered in the affirmative. Hope began to unfurl again in Bucky’s chest. Falcon tossed a metal box to Iron Man.

Iron Man took off his gauntlet and began to work on cracking open the box. The other three men closed ranks around him as robots started to break through the walls. The room’s walls looked like so much Swiss cheese. The holes were now big enough for the robots to easily step through. Bucky fired relentlessly, headshot after headshot. If this gun had been a normal one, the recoil would have turned his shoulder into one giant bruise by now.

The robots swarmed them. They were starting to come faster than even Bucky could shoot, and Bucky could shoot damn fast. He was so overwhelmed he couldn’t even check to see how the others were doing.

Bucky suddenly realized he was trapped. Time seemed to slow. Three robots had surrounded him, and were powering up their chest beams all at once. He couldn’t take all of them out before they fired. If he ducked, one of the others would be shot in the back. And fuck if he was going to leave one of his friends to take a shot meant for him. Distantly, he heard Tony make a noise of triumph which quickly morphed into one of horror.

“Bucky, no!”

Something crashed into his back and then everything went white.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the cliffhanger! Please don't kill me. At least rest assured that nobody is dead. There will be several surprises (including surprise characters and relationships) introduced next chapter. The third and final chapter will include the resolution of Tony's and Bucky's bond as well as the robot issue. Hope you liked this part - and see you soon!


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